Thursday, February 9, 2012

On Friday night, February 3, the University of Nevada Reno hosted its annual card featuring its boxers competing against the Air Force Academy and boxers from the University of San Francisco and the University of Washington, Seattle. It was a night of skillful amateur boxing that included eleven bouts, ten ending in decision and one by RSCH.

The night opened with two female contests, the first a hard fought battle between Rachel Nakanishi of Washington against Jann Shane Hermano of USF. Nakanishi fought well and landed clean and punishing blows from the first round, but the judges called it for Hermano, who exhibited good movement and pulled out a close victory. Taylor Williams from Washington demonstrated admirable determination throughout the three rounds against Nargis Shaghasi of USF, but grew tired and lost a competitive contest.

In the third bout of the evening, Tyrus Korecki of AFA took a decision against a taller and smooth boxing Rashad Burton of the University of Nevada, Las Vegas at 157 pounds. Taylor Yancey of Nevada scored a decision victory of Andrew Munoz of AFA at 137. At 140 pounds Jarred Santos, competing for the first time, won a decision over William Peterson of AFA in one of the night’s most entertaining fights. He showed admirable skill behind a strong, solid left jab against his taller opponent, backing him up for most of the fight while using good head movement and footwork.Nolan Hebei of AFA defeated Bernard Do of Nevada at 160 pounds, dominating him with reach and aggression.José Jimenez scored a 3rd round RSCH over Nevada’s Anthony Donahue. Originally from the Jefferson Park neighborhood on the North Side of Chicago, Donahue has been a Nevada resident since high school, having graduated in Las Vegas before attending UNR. This was Donahue’s first competition, and although he came up short he showed great determination and is full of potential as he heads back to the gym with dedication. Although he suffered two eight counts in the first, he came back to score an eight count of his own in the second. But he suffered two more eight counts, resulting in the mandatory stoppage in the third round. From the opposite end of Donohue’s hometown came the Southside of Chicago’s Cordarius Taylor, representing Nevada at 150 pounds against AFA’s Glenn Miltenberg. While from the fourth row ringside Miltenberg could be seen pelting Taylor with a barrage of punches and keeping him against the ropes for most of all three rounds, the judges saw the fight for Taylor. (Amateur boxing is scored by counting the number of cleanly landed blows, and even though Miltenberg landed plenty and was the only boxer all night who demonstrated a command of the uppercut, he smothered himself often and could not capitalize enough on his momentum to get the nod.) Taylor did land clean blows when he did punch, although he was much less active than Miltenberg. From the fourth row ringside, it appeared Miltenberg won the fight.Alex Flangas of Nevada defeated Robert Watts of California at 175 pounds, and in the same division Dennis Vorobyov defeated Nick Anderson of Nevada. Josue Gayton of Nevada defeated Logan Brandt of AFA at 192 pounds in the final bout of the evening.